I Still Get to Cook and Do Laundry Though

So, this morning as I was putting shoes on the Moose and hollering up to the Princess to finish brushing her teeth and get downstairs, my replacement showed up. He was an older man with a thick mustache and a baseball cap. He was the handyman, and he completely looked the part.

This actually started last week. In conversation, management brought up the fact that one of our welcome packages came with a free hour of service from a local handyman. The conversation included something about my habit of making trips to the hardware store in pairs - one trip to buy something, and another to return it and buy the thing I actually needed (my last trip to Lowe's, I told the girl doing returns that if it wasn't for their lenient return policy, I would have to start building myself another house). I'm pretty sure I excused myself from the conversation at that point, as I was tired and more that a little cranky by then.

A few days later, I was forwarded an email. Management had contacted the handyman in question for an estimate on a small list of tasks that needed to be completed around the house. Nothing major, just little things. A closet door that likes to fall off at inopportune moments, or a tub that doesn't sufficiently hold water. Things like that.

For whatever reason, I was crushed. I felt like I had failed. We're not two months into our first house, and we've already given up on the idea that I can fulfill my duties as man of the house. So here I am looking at this list, and I feel like a wife who has been sent a bill for her husbands prostitute. I realize that probably seems like a bit of hyperbole, but it's how I felt.

(This might be a good place to point out that one of the symptoms of depression is blowing things out of proportion - way out of proportion. The above train of thought is one of the things that tipped me off last week that things might be getting out of hand with my thought processes.)

Obviously, I'll get over it, but it's indicative of the situation we find ourselves in so often. The roles that I grew up thinking I would fulfill no longer really fit the situation I find myself in. It's not that I'm lazy, or even unskilled. Given the time, I could complete these tasks myself. I would have to give up something else though, be it some other task that needs to be done, time with my wife and kids, or whatever. So, the role that I've looked forward to for years just isn't something I can actually do right now.

Oh well. I guess I'll have to be content to be good at what I can get to. After all, that guy probably couldn't program his way out of a paper bag. Also, at least he's an older guy. If some twenty something had showed up, I might very well have called in today.

I still haven't figured out why she hired the pool boy though. It's snowing outside, and we don't actually have a pool. Odd.